The Last Temptation of Christ --why was it ever controversial?

[Drastic]

So, I watched the film "The Last Temptation of Christ" the other night. I rather enjoyed it, thought-provoking and touching on lots of levels.

I have vague memories of there being a great hue and outcry and gnashing of teeth and rending of garments when it was theatrically released. At that time, I paid absolutely zero attention--the film was rather outside the range of the kind of entertainment Drastic ver. 1988 had the remotest interest in. I simply gathered that many Christians were deeply angered and so forth about the way in which Jesus was portrayed, and then forgot about it.

So I've been studying those memories, both while the film was progressing, and afterwards...and I am at a total loss as to why anyone would think it blasphemous. Then again, I'm not Christian myself, so perhaps I'm missing something.

So why was there brouhaha? Why calls for boycotts, demonstrations, pulpit-pounding, and other assorted free publicity? My own theory as to the rationale, were it fully explicated, would belong in the Pit--let's just say it involves some rather denigrating views on the general intelligence levels of anyone being offended at the film.

Was it simply that it portrayed him as troubled? Often frightened and downright anguished by what he was faced with? Rather...human in fact? I sort of thought that that was supposed to have been part of what made the whole Messiah gig such a special deal--that he was just as much man as divine.

I'm not sure if there's even a debate in here--the only mentions of the film I've seen on a couple searches are pretty much my take on it. Simple befuddlement as to why the hubbub that was, bub. I just don't see what there was in the depiction to inspire rage, even among those with a faith investment in the myth/fable/Good News.

[chique]

I couldn't figure it out either, Drastic, although I have a dim recollection that most of the outcry was due to Jesus having sex, even if it was in a 'dream sequence' (I don't know what else to call that bit). Why people were up in arms about a might-have-been is beyond me.

[Cabbage]

I think probably a lot of fundamentalists heard stories about it, and protested it without ever seeing it.

Obviously it doesn't take much to offend some fundamentalists, in this case I think it's simply the fact that the movie chooses to portray the human side of Jesus explicitly. From this (http://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft9602/iannone.html) page:Although he no longer practices his religion and has been married four times, Scorsese claims to be a believer still: "I believe that Jesus is fully divine," he has declared, "but the teaching at Catholic schools placed such an emphasis on the divine side that if Jesus walked into a room, you'd know he was God because he glowed in the dark," instead of being someone "you could sit down with, have dinner or a drink with."The idea that Jesus was fully human, despite being one of the defining principles of Christianity, apparently makes some fundamentalists cringe, particularly when related to such things as sexuality.

[Larry Mudd]

Seems it was a case of a very small section of rabid fundamentalists creating a Tempest in a teapot.

Searching for "blasphemy" and "Last Temptation of Christ" on Google, I found some christian message boards that were threshing it out. The concensus seems to be that it was a fine film, with a few comments from people who have clearly not seen it, like "THIS MOVIE PORTRAYS JESUS AS A HOMOSEXUAL!"
http://www.hollywoodjesus.com/last_temptation.htm

The objection does seem to be based on admitting that Jesus was tempted. I guess that makes the New Testament blasphemous, too..

[Philosophocles]

In the early years of Christianity, there were some people who maintained that Christ merely took human form, but never really had human desires. This belief that denied the humanity of Christ was eventually classified as the Docetist heresy. This has been a heresy in the Christian Church for more than a millenium and a half. Thus, the people who got so upset at the notion that Christ had human desires are really heretics--I'll bring the stake, could someone else fetch the lighter fluid?

[capacitor]

I think that it was because he was depicted as actually thinking long and hard about Satan's temptation at the cross, in vivid and explicit detail, before ultimately rejecting it.

As for me, I don't really care about how Satan is portrayed by some Christians. He is supposed to be the ultimate nemesis, the Lord of Darkness, yet there seems to be a lack of subtlety in how he is portrayed, especially in the three temptations of Jesus after his 40-day fast. TLTOC depicted a really tough temptation, as I would envision Satan to be.

[bdgr]

I tried to watch it to see what all the fuss was about, but I fell asleep half way through it. It needed a car chase or something. I didn't find it that contriversial or anything, just lame. I think the space ship thing from life of brian would have really made it a bit more watchable.

[astorian]

Two cents from a Catholic:

"The Last TEmptation of Christ" was not, in my opinion, a blasphemous or anti-Christian. A bad movie, certainly. An incredibly boring movie, you bet! A movie with the most ridiculous casting since "The GReatest Story Ever Told," definitely. But not blasphemous.

Now, it's important to note that the film, like Nikos Kazantzakis' novel, was explicitly fictional! Neither Scorsese nor Kazantzakis ever claimed that they were presenting a literal account of the life of Jesus.

Kazantzakis was a man who was constantly torn between the strict, ascetic Christianity he was raised with and the pleasures of the flesh. He was trying to work out his own problems by imagining Jesus as a weak man like himself. To use an analogy, Peter Shaffer certainly desn't believe that Antonio Salieri murdered Mozart- rather, he used an age-old rumor as a way of meditating on his own, personal issues ("how do I, a successful, acclaimed artist know if I'm REALLY any good?").

I think it's legitimate to envision Jesus as a man struggling with fear and doubt. I only wish that a better film had been made of Kazantzakis' interesting premise (and flawed novel).

I should note, in partial defense of the fundamentalists, that rumors first arose while I was in high school that a pornographer was planning a feature length film portraying Jesus as a gay lecher. WAS there ever such a filmmaker, and was such a film ever REALLY in thenworks? Who knows! I suspect not. ALl we DO know is that such a film was never really made. Still, the rumor has persisted to this very day, just as I STILL regularly see petitions defending the Apollo astronauts against Madeleine Murray O'Hair! (I FIRST saw such petitions when I was in grade school).

For Pete's sake, the old bat is dead! Leave her her in peace! Enough with the petitions!

Fact remains, once a rumor is out there, there's no stopping it. My HUNCH (and it's only a hunch) is that a LOT of the people who were most outraged about "The Last Temptation of Christ" were people who'd heard those old rumors about a gay-Jesus-porn-movie, and were convinced that this was it.

[Dr.Pinky]

I just watched this last night (for the 1st time) and wouldn't trash it quite as thoroughly as astorian. The Peter Gabriel soundtrack was cool. I also enjoyed the way Judas was portrayed as a 'political' rebel.

Actually, the only thing that nagged at the back of my mind was "Where are they getting all the trees for these crosses?"

I'm a big fan of Kazanzakis, and I would advise taking astorian's mini-biography with a grain of salt, too. Otherwise, 3/5 stars.

[Fionn]

Originally posted by chique
I couldn't figure it out either, Drastic, although I have a dim recollection that most of the outcry was due to Jesus having sex, even if it was in a 'dream sequence' (I don't know what else to call that bit). Why people were up in arms about a might-have-been is beyond me.

I recall a friend's sister, who belonged to a family who went to church three times a week, telling me that the movie was supposed to depict Jesus having sex with his mother. She hadn't seen it at the time, so this was apparently one of the rumors about the movie.

[pennylane]

Before I saw the movie Crash, I believed it was about people having sex with the dead bodies of accident victims.
You should never believe everything you hear about a movie before you watch it. If the movie has anything to do with sex, religion, or politics, don't believe anything you hear about it before you watch it.

[AHunter3]

IANAC and IACNAF (I am certainly not a fundamentalist); but I found the film annoying and insulting to Jesus of Nazareth, who was depicted as being dumb as a box of rocks and with no clue as to what he was doing or why other than "it's my role".

Of course, the overly literal-minded presentation of Satan and his temptations was awfully silly too.

[rjung]

Originally posted by Drastic
So why was there brouhaha? Why calls for boycotts, demonstrations, pulpit-pounding, and other assorted free publicity? My own theory as to the rationale, were it fully explicated, would belong in the Pit--let's just say it involves some rather denigrating views on the general intelligence levels of anyone being offended at the film.
Why restrain yourself? The Last Temptation of Christ got fragged because there are some religious fundamentalists who get their panties all bunched up if their religious icon is shown in anything other than a flawless, perfect light. Never mind that the movie was (ultimately) just someone's opinion and was not any sort of new religious direction from the Pope/priest/head rabbi/whoever -- it didn't depict Christ perfectly, ergo it was blasphemy, ergo there had to be a religious crusade. I would draw an analogy between the protesters and the popular depiction of Christ as a shepherd, but I'm sure you can draw that just fine by yourself. :)

Originally posted by Cabbage
I think probably a lot of fundamentalists heard stories about it, and protested it without ever seeing it.
Actually seeing the movie would require thinking about it. And if there's one thing that religion teaches people, it's that thinking is bad -- just shaddup, accept what the leaders tell you, and toss more money into the collection plate.

For additional laughs, go look up some news archives about the similar protests over Monty Python's Life of Brian. Here we're talking about a movie that was (a) clearly a comedy and (b) had nothing to do with Christ himself, but the fundamentalists were bored that week and decided to get outdoors or something...

[Musicat]

Originally posted by AHunter3
...I found the film annoying and insulting to Jesus of Nazareth...

And that is what many people felt. Whether they saw the movie or not was not important to them; any insult to their god might be blasphemous and should not be shown to anyone. Sort of Pascal's wager in reverse.

No theaters in a 50-mile radius from me exhibited it at the time it was released. One theater owner said he had been asked not to by friends & neighbors who supposedly suggested they wouldn't patronize the theater anymore if he showed it. And it's a small town.

"Quivering with courage," as Walt Kelly so eloquently put it, the film was dropped from the exhibition list.

[pldennison]

Originally posted by rjung
And if there's one thing that religion teaches people, it's that thinking is bad -- just shaddup, accept what the leaders tell you, and toss more money into the collection plate.

This is, like, the third time I've seen this today in GD. Did I wake up in an alternate universe, as a poster on the SWMB (Sweeping Generalizations Message Board)?

Please, rjung, if you would, describe for us all the long history Judaism has of discouraging thinking and attempting to bilk money from its adherents. For followup, please do the same for the Jesuits.

[Sam Stone]

The movie is anything BUT blasphemous.

If you read the scriptures, the whole point to Jesus coming to Earth was to live as a man, feeling all the same temptations, fears, insecurities, pain, etc. After all, if he was just a God in man's clothing it wouldn't be much of a sacrifice, would it? And the whole point was that Jesus had to sacrifice his life.

So the movie that portrays him as actually being tempted by all kinds of pleasures by refusing to be sacrificed, yet choosing the sacrifice anyway, makes him heroic. If you ask me, that's a pretty positive view of the man.

[xicanorex]

I too saw the coming when it came out and wasn't really 100% why the fundies were opposed to this movie. Sure, he is not portrayed as a "G-d", but neither is this portrayal a blatant sacrilegious portrait. As a matter of fact, I think there are a lot of Catholic images from Scocerse's background that appear in this movie that would make any Catholic proud (i.e., the scene of the lamb and the lion, the Sacred Heart scene, etc). Of course, having Harvey Keitel as an ancient Hebrew villager is kind of screwed up (the accent I mean).

XicanoreX

[xicanorex]

I too saw the coming when it came out and wasn't really

A, dang! reply button! I meant to say, "I too saw the movie when it came out . .", not that I particularly saw the Second Comming of Jesus that year and he went back after what he saw being done in his name. ;)

XicanoreX

[Drastic]

Why restrain yourself?

Well, mostly because Christian-needling is all too easy, and my religious outlook is no longer shoulder-chip based. I also thought perhaps there was actually some obscure but deep theological reason behind the original controversy, other than offended parties simply having box elder bugs living in their heads.

I've got to say, though, that the bugs are looking more and more likely.

[rjung]

Originally posted by pldennison
Originally posted by rjung
And if there's one thing that religion teaches people, it's that thinking is bad -- just shaddup, accept what the leaders tell you, and toss more money into the collection plate.
This is, like, the third time I've seen this today in GD. Did I wake up in an alternate universe, as a poster on the SWMB (Sweeping Generalizations Message Board)?
Did you check the sign on your reality before waking up this morning? :) If not, then blame it as leftover crankiness from a weekend spent hauling furniture from one house to another.

Please, rjung, if you would, describe for us all the long history Judaism has of discouraging thinking and attempting to bilk money from its adherents. For followup, please do the same for the Jesuits.
I don't know of any church/temple/synagogue/whatever that encourages active discussion of the nonexistence of God, do you? Or, if you want to tie it in to the OP, tell me why most of the folks who were condemning The Last Temptation of Christ didn't bother to see the movie for themselves and formed their own opinions -- as opposed to being told, "We must protest this blasphemous film!" and showing up bright-and-early the next morning without question...

[pldennison]

Originally posted by rjung
Please, rjung, if you would, describe for us all the long history Judaism has of discouraging thinking and attempting to bilk money from its adherents. For followup, please do the same for the Jesuits.
I don't know of any church/temple/synagogue/whatever that encourages active discussion of the nonexistence of God, do you?

What does that have to do with what you said, which was, and I quote, "And if there's one thing that religion teaches people, it's that thinking is bad." You didn't say, "Contemplating the nonexistence of God is bad," now did you? Or is that the only kind of thinking there is?

I'd actually appreciate an answer rather than a dodge, if you don't mind. Do you really believe that Judaism, Christianity, Islam, or Buddhism, in the general sense, actively discourage thought among believers?

Or, if you want to tie it in to the OP, tell me why most of the folks who were condemning The Last Temptation of Christ didn't bother to see the movie for themselves and formed their own opinions -- as opposed to being told, "We must protest this blasphemous film!" and showing up bright-and-early the next morning without question...

I would bet two things here: A) Most theaters that did see any protests probably saw a very small number of protestors, and II) The number of people protesting constituted such a small part of the entire community of religious believers as to be statistically insignificant.

[Mr. Billy]

This is my first post ever. I hope it's of interest to someone other than me.

A few thoughts about the outrage concerning The Last Temptation of Christ.

1. Not everyone who had qualms about LToC is "a fundamentalist". Kazantzakis himself was aware that he was walking the edge of irreverence, by speculating about the humanness of Jesus the Christ in explicit terms.

B. I think the outrage may have had a good deal to do with the perceived motivations of the movie makers, and the sometimes combative nature of sincerely held belief. The church has been hashing out the implications of Christ's dual nature for about 2000 years now, with mixed results on the civility front, even among believers.

So, perhaps LToC was not exactly the best way to turn a big summer movie profit without engendering a PR bloodbath. In the end, both the medium and the messenger were grossly inappropriate for the subject matter. It should not require too keen an insight into human nature to understand that.

iii. I wish folks would quit using the word "fundamentalist" around here. It seems to be little more than a name people call others when they don't really want to talk to them anymore. Its only purpose is to place certain people and their ideas beyond the intellectual pale. This -- I think -- is a terrible shame.

I hope that sheds some light. Thanks for reading. Soli deo gloria.

--B

[Drastic]

1. Not everyone who had qualms about LToC is "a fundamentalist". Kazantzakis himself was aware that he was walking the edge of irreverence, by speculating about the humanness of Jesus the Christ in explicit terms.

Ah, but I'm not after qualms. I can understand qualms aplenty for the film--discomfort with painting Judas as downright noble, that (as Ahunter3 noted) Jesus did seem a trifle dim (to be fair, that is an all-too-human quality), and so on. I'm trying to understand the outrage. Different thing entirely, in my way of seeing things.

B. I think the outrage may have had a good deal to do with the perceived motivations of the movie makers, and the sometimes combative nature of sincerely held belief. The church has been hashing out the implications of Christ's dual nature for about 2000 years now, with mixed results on the civility front, even among believers.

Clause the second is a valid answer, I suppose--outrage happens because belief leads to outrage. I think there's a kernel of another GD in that--why does belief lead so often to combative anger?

Clause the first is...interesting. Which perceived motivations would those be?


In the end, both the medium and the messenger were grossly inappropriate for the subject matter. It should not require too keen an insight into human nature to understand that.

Why is a motion picture a grossly inappropriate medium for religious subject matter? Is it in general, or simply for the duality of Christ in specific? Was the novel the film was based on likewise grossly inappropriate, and again if so, why?

And likewise for the messenger--but before that, which messenger? The actors? Scorsese? Whichever studio produced it? Or is this a more amorphous "Godless Hollywood!" kind of thing?

[Pepper Mill]

TLToC was roundly condemned for showing a Jesus having sex with Mary Magdalene and being far too human. Never mind that the Joys of Family Life was one of the Temptations... some people can't see past the surface (Jesus! Having sex! Blasphemy!!) Catholics were among those condemning this film, and of course most of them hadn't seen it.

None of this is exactly original. Some Gnostics believed that Christ and Mary did have sex. I've read books that claimed some apocryphal texts showed Jesus as homosexual. But this movie brough it out in public, which was the big crime (after all, the book had been in print for ages).

For What It's Worth, I didn't think the movie at all boring or blasphemus. It was original and not fawning.

[CalMeacham]

Actually, that last post was mine -- I hadn't noticed that Pepper hadn't logged out.

[gobear]

I'd actually appreciate an answer rather than a dodge, if you don't mind. Do you really believe that Judaism, Christianity, Islam, or Buddhism, in the general sense, actively discourage thought among believers?

I'll take that question. If you define "thought" as being able to question doctrine and teachings, then the answer is "Yes". All four of the religions, (yes, even Buddhism) have a history of coming down hard on doubters within the ranks.
In Judaism, we have Baruch Spinoza being driven from Amsterdam by the hostility of the local congregation. Today, the extremists of the Mea Shearim neighborhood in Jerusalem throw rocks at cars driving by on the Sabbath. Look at how the different sects of Judaism view each other with suspicion and hostility. The history of Christian intolerance of heresy is stained with blood. As for Islam, well, look at the writers in Egypt who have been muffled by religious courts, the world-wide death threats against Salman Rushdie for writing a novel nobody read, and the Taliban's behavior. As for Buddhism, well, the Red Hat Lamaist order in Tibet have a standing death threat against the Dalai Lama, and I have seen monks fighting with lead pipes over an abbot's succession at Chogye Temple in Seoul.

IMHO, the furor over Scorsese's film arose because Christian fundamentalists have become unconscious heretics. The Bible is quite clear that Jesus was tempted in all things, so he could feel sympathy for our weaknesses.

Our High Priest is not one who cannot feel sympathy for our weaknesses. On the contrary, we have a High Priest who was tempted in every way that we are, but did not sin. (Hebrews 4:15, Today's English Version)

The fundies deny Jesus's humanity, just like the Gnostics did back in Paul's day. To the fundies, Jesus is some happy, smiling deity who blesses the good and curses the wicked. The idea that Jesus could have felt hungry or sleepy is blasphemous (even though he did both in the Bible).
Heaven forfend that Jesus could have identified with the humans he created so much that he could have been tempted by sexual desire for one of them.

[Mr. Billy]

This is kind of fun. I hope it will be a useful response.

ON OUTRAGE: Imagine what would happen if Steven Spielberg decided to film a musical comedy, about a young Martin Luther King, struggling to decide between the life of a civil rights crusader and his life-long desire to become a singing shoe shine boy.

"...STARRING DENZELL WASHINGTON, WITH ORIGINAL MUSIC BY 'NSYNC and ROB ZOMBIE!..."

If the film explicitly disavowed any representation of the events as historical fact, and was careful never to actually show Dr. King in an un-sympathetic light, do you imagine that it would surprise you very much if there were outrage from some elements within the leadership of the NAACP?

Now recall that the people who puzzle you so hold Jesus Christ in infinitely higher regard than even a man as good as Dr. King.

That's why there's a tendency to express outrage.

ON THE INAPPROPRIATENESS OF LToC: A summer blockbuster, complete with bare breasts, is not the ideal vehicle for taking on the dual nature of Christ as a Big Idea, and a large group of secular people with little sensitivity to the theological issues involved, are not exactly the ideal folks for doing the deep public thinking, if you are not also looking for a messy PR wrangle with the Rev. Jerry Falwell. A movie like LToC seems to tread pretty disrespectfully on the central focus of a lot of peole's lives. Therein lies the problem.

I'm not here to argue in favor of acrimony and righteous indignation as evangelical tactics. But neither do I think that it is so very difficult to understand what it is that rankles the fightin' fundies.

[Mr. Billy]

To my way of thinking, the book is far less troublesome than the movie, in spite of the fact that the latter is -- as I recall -- almost woodenly faithful to the former.

The trick is that Nikos Kazantzakis goes to pretty great and convincing lengths in his introduction, to explain his intentions amd his reservations about the task of exploring Christ's humanity. By way of contrast, I do not believe that Martin Scorsese has ever portrayed himself as a follower, or even an admirer, in any serious sense, of Jesus Christ.

That sort of thing does matter. It's the difference between respectful engagement with the deeply-treasured articles of one's own faith, and glib condescension to things held in low regard, while in search of another buck.

Mr. Scorsese is free to do as he pleases -- and I don't claim to know the the state of his soul, or the contents of his mind -- but I think he's engaged in a very different enterprise than the on Mr. Kazantzakis was after.

Again, it's just that folks tend to take it personally, when they think you're giving the things that matter most to them the short shrift, respect-wise. In and of itself, there's really nothing so inscrutable about that.

OK. Now you know everything that I think about this one. Lucky you.

--B

[Drastic]

ON OUTRAGE: Imagine what would happen if Steven Spielberg decided to film a musical comedy, about a young Martin Luther King, struggling to decide between the life of a civil rights crusader and his life-long desire to become a singing shoe shine boy.

I'm aware of no part of King's biography that detail a dream, lifelong or otherwise, of being a singing shoe shine boy--much less any part that treated that dream as a central and important factor in his entire nature. Spielberg's hypothetical film would be a fictional treatment about a theme that didn't exist previously.

In the Gospels, Christ's very human temptation and anguish are detailed, and are a central and important factor in his entire nature. Scorsese's film, and the novel it was based upon, was a fictional treatment about a theme that did exist previously, right in the source material. In fact, source material that disavowed that theme's truth was declared heretical fairly early on, as others have noted.

To put it lightly, your analogy is...more than a little flawed.

ON THE INAPPROPRIATENESS OF LToC: A summer blockbuster, complete with bare breasts, is not the ideal vehicle for taking on the dual nature of Christ as a Big Idea,

Yes, you've said that already. What you've skipped over (an oversight, I'm sure) while repeating it is the answer to "why?"


and a large group of secular people with little sensitivity to the theological issues involved, are not exactly the ideal folks for doing the deep public thinking, if you are not also looking for a messy PR wrangle with the Rev. Jerry Falwell.

So your answer to the "which messenger question" is an amorphous "Godless Hollywood!" thing, then?

Which aspects of the film displayed little sensitivity to the theological issues involved? And which issues, specifically, did they display little sensitivity towards?


A movie like LToC seems to tread pretty disrespectfully on the central focus of a lot of peole's lives. Therein lies the problem.

Again, how so? Which aspects of the film tread disrespectfully?


But neither do I think that it is so very difficult to understand what it is that rankles the fightin' fundies.

Then it should be very easy to elucidate it, yes? So far your clearest statement is that people got combative because belief gets combative. That I understand pretty well (history runs red with it; that it was limited in this day and age to harsh words speaks well of this day and age) but I was hoping for something beyond that--something a bit less depressing.

And I thought you wanted to avoid the f-word that you thought was a terrible shame?

[tracer]

Ballybay wrote:

I recall a friend's sister, who belonged to a family who went to church three times a week, telling me that the movie was supposed to depict Jesus having sex with his mother.
Well, she was partly right. Jesus was depicted as having sex with Mary. It just happened to be the "other" Mary.

[Drastic]

The trick is that Nikos Kazantzakis goes to pretty great and convincing lengths in his introduction, to explain his intentions amd his reservations about the task of exploring Christ's humanity. By way of contrast, I do not believe that Martin Scorsese has ever portrayed himself as a follower, or even an admirer, in any serious sense, of Jesus Christ.

That sort of thing does matter. It's the difference between respectful engagement with the deeply-treasured articles of one's own faith, and glib condescension to things held in low regard, while in search of another buck.

If the only printings available of the novel were without the author's introduction, would the novel then be seen as glib condescension?

Contrariwise, if the film had included perhaps half an hour of the director delivering a soulful and wholly believable monologue to the audience, touching on similar things to Kazantzakis' introduction--the film would then have been respectful?

Essentially you're saying that the meaning of the work itself doesn't matter, only assumptions about the creator of the work. That right there would be the disconnect, and the source of my apparently inexplicable curiosity.

[sjc]

Originally posted by Mr. Billy
ON THE INAPPROPRIATENESS OF LToC: A summer blockbuster, complete with bare breasts, is not the ideal vehicle for taking on the dual nature of Christ as a Big Idea, and a large group of secular people with little sensitivity to the theological issues involved, are not exactly the ideal folks for doing the deep public thinking, if you are not also looking for a messy PR wrangle with the Rev. Jerry Falwell.[/B]

I disagree wholeheartedly! Hollywood can do just as good a job at taking on the dual nature of Christ as anyone.

[Mr. Billy]

Thanks for your interaction. It would have been a bummer to post my first post and be met with deafening silence.

Ne'ertheless, I'm going to stop after this one, because it's starting to feel as though there's no explanation that's going to satisfy you. That's fine, I guess, but after a while, discussions like this can start to feel like a long, boring ping-pong match.

Anyhow...

You're right that I'm repeating myself, but that's only because I don't seem to be making my very small point terribly clear. All that I have been trying to point out is that people's religious beliefs are a very touchy matter, and it isn't actually a deep mystery of the universe when people take offense at what they perceive to be a disrespectful treatment of them. That's all. You don't have to like that. I don't always like that. But surely it's not surprising to you that that's how people are.

I don't know that the analogy of a bad MLK movie is entirely inappropriate on this matter, but we can differ on that one. I was only trying to create a secular parallel, in the hope that it would make it easier for you to empathize with the folks who were upset about LToC. If it doesn't clarify things, then by all means, ignore it.

I'm not expressing ill-will toward "godless Hollywood" (a phrase that only you have used thus far). I read the book and I saw the movie (twice) and they served as an open door to a number of questions about Christ's dual nature that -- frankly -- most Christians don't spend enough time thinking through. Nevertheless, it is true that Hollywood has not exactly distinguished itself as a great friend of organized religion, historically speaking. Accordingly, lots of Christians were suspicious of Scorsese's motives. Is it a little bit small and a lot misguided to jump from mere suspicion to the conclusion that we are therefore confronted by diabolical forces in the marketing of LToC? It sure is. But people are just people, as I keep saying.

The fact that Kazantzakis DID include an explanation of his motives as a part of his novel and Scorsese DIDN'T do any such thing as a part of his movie is precisely the point, I think. Authorial intent is a major component of meaning, particularly where it is explicitly stated. If Scorsese had intended to avoid stirring up so much resentment, he could easily have done so. But prayerful reflection and civil debate weren't what he was driving at. Controversy puts fannies in the seats and works wonders for an artist's reputation as a transgressive thinker. In large part, Scorsese got what he was looking for.

From a Christian perspective, there is something theologically iffy -- and therefore, I have chosen to use the word 'inappropriate' -- about the suggestion that Jesus spent a couple of hours hanging on the cross in wistful rumination about the wife and family that he never had. Like the notion of MLK as shoeshine boy, the gospels don't indicate that any such episode ever took place, and insofar as Christ's confrontations with temptation are concerned, the gospels never invite us to believe that His responses were anything other than an immediate and emphatic 'no'. Kazantzakis has merely interpolated it as a possibility, based upon certain elements of eastern orthodox Christology. You may not accept that there's anything questionable about that, but you didn't ask, 'Why do I have to be outraged about LToC?' You asked, 'Why were those people outraged about LToC?' You don't have to be outraged abotu anything at all, if you don't want. Those people were outraged because they thought the treatment of the question was focused too strongly on prurient and entirely speculative material, for no purpose other than the pursuit of the Almighty Dollar.

Really and truly, I hope that makes some sense of the controversy for you. Thanks again for your responses.

[Drastic]

Ne'ertheless, I'm going to stop after this one, because it's starting to feel as though there's no explanation that's going to satisfy you.

Well, I would suggest that that is because there hasn't been explanation, merely a wide-eyed repetition of "but it's so simple!" Ambrose Bierce's definition of "self-evident" ("evident to one's self, and to no one else") comes to mind here.


You're right that I'm repeating myself, but that's only because I don't seem to be making my very small point terribly clear.

I don't think the point is as small as you believe it to be. It's something that can be expanded on, dug into, clarified.


All that I have been trying to point out is that people's religious beliefs are a very touchy matter, and it isn't actually a deep mystery of the universe when people take offense at what they perceive to be a disrespectful treatment of them. That's all. You don't have to like that. I don't always like that. But surely it's not surprising to you that that's how people are.

Mostly, it's surprising to me that people find it seemingly impossible to actually discuss why that is.

Look, I'll break this down very simply, as to why this is looking increasingly bizarre to me:

D: So, I just saw LToC. I know some people got very offended. Why?
MB: You have to understand that people get offended!
D: Er...I do. I'd like to know why.
MB: They do! What's so difficult to understand about that?
D: <resists temptation of his own>

Why is "why?" such an inexplicable question?


I'm not expressing ill-will toward "godless Hollywood" (a phrase that only you have used thus far). I read the book and I saw the movie (twice) and they served as an open door to a number of questions about Christ's dual nature that -- frankly -- most Christians don't spend enough time thinking through.

Not ill-will as such--what you have repeated (and not explained) is that the movie industry, and movies in general, are "grossly inappropriate" vehicles for such a theme. What got passed over, again, is the why. And it's a position that seems oddly out-of-step with your statement just above. It's grossly inappropriate, but was a door to a number of questions Christians should spend more time on?


Is it a little bit small and a lot misguided to jump from mere suspicion to the conclusion that we are therefore confronted by diabolical forces in the marketing of LToC? It sure is. But people are just people, as I keep saying.

See, that's the thing. What I was after was to see if there were any reasons that weren't small and misguided, and if there were to discuss them. I'm not convinced that there definitively aren't, but if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, well.


The fact that Kazantzakis DID include an explanation of his motives as a part of his novel and Scorsese DIDN'T do any such thing as a part of his movie is precisely the point, I think. Authorial intent is a major component of meaning, particularly where it is explicitly stated.

So again, the meaning of a work itself is irrelevant? If all extant copies of the novel were rounded up (a miracle was performed, either divine or diabolical, to accomplish this), and then replaced with copies exactly the same, with the omission of the explicit statement of intent...the nature of the novel would then change?

Also, how do you know he wasn't lying? Setting down an introduction "in character" so to speak?


If Scorsese had intended to avoid stirring up so much resentment, he could easily have done so. But prayerful reflection and civil debate weren't what he was driving at. Controversy puts fannies in the seats and works wonders for an artist's reputation as a transgressive thinker. In large part, Scorsese got what he was looking for.

All that may well be--I don't know the man. Where does your knowledge of his exact intent come from, by the by? I suspect that it comes from the same place that your knowledge of the author's intent does--am I wrong?


From a Christian perspective, there is something theologically iffy -- and therefore, I have chosen to use the word 'inappropriate' -- about the suggestion that Jesus spent a couple of hours hanging on the cross in wistful rumination about the wife and family that he never had. Like the notion of MLK as shoeshine boy, the gospels don't indicate that any such episode ever took place, and insofar as Christ's confrontations with temptation are concerned, the gospels never invite us to believe that His responses were anything other than an immediate and emphatic 'no'.

Before the next volley of hunchbacks, thank you for the above. I don't understand why it arrived so late in the game, though. Was this arguable theological disconnect expressed at all, and the media simply never (or rarely) gave time to it? Why is the thoughtfulness of it absent from the bulk of the scattered livid "reviews" of the film I've run across? There's a core of discussion in the above--why the theological interpretation of anguish-without-temptation is more valid than the interpretation of anguish-with, or vice versa. I would think that Christians should be in favor of such discussions--isn't working towards a knowledge and understanding of the nature of the Christ pretty much important to the whole thing? So why wasn't the controversy used as an opportunity to witness effectively, instead of merely flail about in outrage?


Those people were outraged because they thought the treatment of the question was focused too strongly on prurient and entirely speculative material, for no purpose other than the pursuit of the Almighty Dollar.

Really and truly, I hope that makes some sense of the controversy for you. Thanks again for your responses.
It really has. It's tended to reinforce my original theories, which I honestly were hoping weren't the case. Still, thank you, this was far closer to what I was hoping for than a chorus of "ha ha, those silly Christians!" ever was.

[rjung]

Originally posted by pldennison
I'd actually appreciate an answer rather than a dodge, if you don't mind. Do you really believe that Judaism, Christianity, Islam, or Buddhism, in the general sense, actively discourage thought among believers?
To avoid hijacking this thread further, I'll give the short answer of "yes". All religions, at their core, require followers to take things up on faith -- acceptance of things without evidence or reasoning or support -- which is anathema to (critical) thinking.

(Props to gobear for providing some examples)

I would bet two things here: A) Most theaters that did see any protests probably saw a very small number of protestors, and II) The number of people protesting constituted such a small part of the entire community of religious believers as to be statistically insignificant.
Really? Kinda odd that Drastic even remembers the protesters in his/her OP, then, if they were so "statistically insignificant". As I recall from the local Los Angeles news reports, theaters had anywhere from 20 to 100+ people protesting, to the point where owners had to get police to prevent them from blocking access to the box office.

[pldennison]

Originally posted by rjung
To avoid hijacking this thread further, I'll give the short answer of "yes". All religions, at their core, require followers to take things up on faith -- acceptance of things without evidence or reasoning or support -- which is anathema to (critical) thinking.

I will simply offer the Jesuits as a counterexample, as well as centuries of Christian and Jewish theologians applying critical thinking to their own faith.

Really? Kinda odd that Drastic even remembers the protesters in his/her OP, then, if they were so "statistically insignificant".

Not really. For one thing, Drastic has "vague memories of there being a great hue and outcry and gnashing of teeth and rending of garments when it was theatrically released." Vague memories are not, by definition, concrete remembrances. It's entirely possible that Drastic's exposure to later popular conception of the "hue and outcry" causes him to misremember exactly how vocal and prominent they were.

For another, a protest in front of a movie theater, in most cities, is sufficiently unusual that one would probably remember it whether it was 10 protestors or 100.

For another . . .

As I recall from the local Los Angeles news reports, theaters had anywhere from 20 to 100+ people protesting, to the point where owners had to get police to prevent them from blocking access to the box office.

There are 2 billion Christians in the world. There are about 150 million in the United States. Let's be generous and say that 5% would constitute a statistically significant number of protestors. Do you really think there were 7.5 million people protesting in front of theaters? Gimme a break.

[Tominator2]

All religions, at their core, require followers to take things up on faith -- acceptance of things without evidence or reasoning or support -- which is anathema to (critical) thinking.You wrote "religions" when you meant "systems of thought".

[Drastic]

Not really. For one thing, Drastic has "vague memories of there being a great hue and outcry and gnashing of teeth and rending of garments when it was theatrically released." Vague memories are not, by definition, concrete remembrances.

Just so. Pretty much I vaguely remember some newspaper articles, and various talking heads on the news down to daytime talk shows that I'd either channel flip past, or not really be paying much attention to as my nose was deep in some book as my sister watched Donahue or whatever. (Ah, the days before talk shows consisted of people throwing chairs at one another.) I have zero recall of mention of any protests in my area.

Likewise, in all lists of user reviews that I've run across, there are simply a small handful of livid negative ones, mixed into a bunch of mostly positive ones. A great many of the positive ones start with the reviewers identifying themselves as Christian, usually with some verbiage about how it's a shame that others reacted so negatively, yadda etc. Now, user reviews on movie sites are hardly any more representative than media coverage of protests, but it does suggest that mainly people saw the outcry as being more extensive than it was more because it was narrated as such, than because of actual size of it.

I suspect the hue and outcry and whatnot was over-played and -emphasized by the media, simply because that made for more colorful stories.

However, I do think that there is an unfortunate tendency in religious people to avoid discussing whys and wherefores of both beliefs and to avoid honest attempts to explain actions in relation to them. I don't blame religion for this--I think it's simply a human tendency that people use religion as an excuse to reinforce, just as secular types do with political axes to grind and so forth.

[Mr. Billy]

Can't stay away.

>Before the next volley of hunchbacks, thank you for the >above.

What's a hunchback?

>I don't understand why it arrived so late in the game, >though.

It arrived late in the game because I think you are glossing over an important point when you brush aside the fact that people get defensive about their most deeply held beliefs. Some people are going to fight you, if you express something that sounds to them like dissent. In a lot of ways, that's as deep as this controversy ever went. I hate to confirm your suspicions, but it's true (especially in the case of the very small minority of Christians who did all of the protesting).

At any rate, we can drop this side of the discussion if you want. (the combativeness of human nature, movies as suitable medium for serious theology, importance and knowability of authorial intent, etc.) Clearly, it's going nowhere anyway.

Here -- I gather -- is the good stuff:

>Was this arguable theological disconnect expressed at all, >and the media simply never (or rarely) gave time to it?

Sure, it was expressed. But not by the people who were doing all of the protesting. It was expressed by a lot of pastors and college professors who were interested in getting their audiences to grapple with some difficult questions. In fact, the majority of the Church. But that sort of thing never got into the newspapers -- and understandably so -- because, really, who cares? In fairness to The Media, would you buy a newspaper with a big, 5 column headline that says: "PASTORS, THEOLOGIANS ENCOURAGE PRAYERFUL CONSIDERATION OF CHRIST'S INCARNATION"? Me neither.

We're not really talking about a difficulty with LToC that's merely arguable, though. It is a fact that we're on thin ice, as far as Christian orthodoxy is concerned, when we begin to suggest that Jesus Christ may have fantasized -- fondly and at length -- about turning his back on the fulfillment of salvation history itself, in favor of a wife and a couple of kids. There is a fine line between being tempted and giving in to temptation, but that suggestion puts Jesus on the wrong side of the line. That's why Kazantzakis was so careful to lay out his intentions when he published the novel.

>Why is the thoughtfulness of it absent from the bulk of >the scattered livid "reviews" of the film I've run across?

I never read any livid reviews of LToC. More commonly, they were mildly positive, with a great deal of bemused speculation about what's got so far under Jerry Falwell's saddle that he's out there marching around in front of the General Cinemas, morning, noon and night.

>There's a core of discussion in the above--why the >theological interpretation of anguish-without-temptation >is more valid than the interpretation of anguish-with, or >vice versa.

I'm not sure I understand this question yet. Help me out.

>I would think that Christians should be in favor of such >discussions--isn't working towards a knowledge and >understanding of the nature of the Christ pretty much >important to the whole thing?

The vast majority of Christians ARE in favor of this kind of discussion. What very few of us are terribly enthusiastic about is being told by Willem Defoe and Roger Ebert how we ought to go about engaging in it. But even at that, the protestors only represented a very small minority of the Church.

>So why wasn't the controversy used as an opportunity to >witness effectively, instead of merely flail about in >outrage?

To be honest, because a lot of the folks who were NOT out protesting didn't really get the impression that anybody wanted to know what they thought about it. I will confess that that was my assumption about your attitude, coming into this discussion. I'll quit trying to speak for the outragers.

If that gets us onto a track that gives you more useful information, then I'm glad.

--B

[Drastic]

Can't stay away.

That last temptation is always the hardest. :)


What's a hunchback?

The small symbol that ends your very own sentence. To wit, "?"--from the shape, you see. Its brother and constant adversary is the soldier, "!" from its ramrod spine.


It arrived late in the game because I think you are glossing over an important point when you brush aside the fact that people get defensive about their most deeply held beliefs. Some people are going to fight you, if you express something that sounds to them like dissent. In a lot of ways, that's as deep as this controversy ever went. I hate to confirm your suspicions, but it's true (especially in the case of the very small minority of Christians who did all of the protesting).

At any rate, we can drop this side of the discussion if you want. (the combativeness of human nature, movies as suitable medium for serious theology, importance and knowability of authorial intent, etc.) Clearly, it's going nowhere anyway.

I am doing my level best to be patient here, so I will attempt this another time: I am not brushing it aside. I acknowledge that they do. What I am getting at, and am having annoying inner whispers about the thickness of skulls about that I were rather wrong, is why that is. "...that's as deep as this controversy ever went." Fine and well--but I maintain that that is rather deeper than the shallowness you appear to maintain. From my viewpoint, you're the one brushing it aside as "just the way it is." No. There are whys, and the whys run deep, and I daresay they might even intersect with aspects of the Messiah narrative in interesting ways regardless of one's
personal belief in it or lack of it. I am intrigued by the combativeness of human nature--I do not think it's something that should be viewed as utterly inexplicable. I remain curious as to why movies aren't a suitable medium--that you keep avoiding tackling the why of that makes me suspect you're not all that sure yourself. Likewise the questions of authorial intent.

Frankly, I'm boggled that my line of questioning even remotely suggests that I want to "drop that".


Sure, it was expressed. But not by the people who were doing all of the protesting. It was expressed by a lot of pastors and college professors who were interested in getting their audiences to grapple with some difficult questions. In fact, the majority of the Church. But that sort of thing never got into the newspapers -- and understandably so -- because, really, who cares? In fairness to The Media, would you buy a newspaper with a big, 5 column headline that says: "PASTORS, THEOLOGIANS ENCOURAGE PRAYERFUL CONSIDERATION OF CHRIST'S INCARNATION"? Me neither.

I don't buy newspapers as they are. Coverage tends to be too shallow, too simplistic. (And besides, with the internet, shallow and simplistic news coverage is free.) A headline like that would make me doubletake, and more likely to read it.


We're not really talking about a difficulty with LToC that's merely arguable, though. It is a fact that we're on thin ice, as far as Christian orthodoxy is concerned, when we begin to suggest that Jesus Christ may have fantasized -- fondly and at length -- about turning his back on the fulfillment of salvation history itself, in favor of a wife and a couple of kids. There is a fine line between being tempted and giving in to temptation, but that suggestion puts Jesus on the wrong side of the line. That's why Kazantzakis was so careful to lay out his intentions when he published the novel.

Why does it put him on the wrong side of the line? I've never read the novel, so all I have is the film, without that magical explicit authorial statement of intent. So I'm judging the work itself (alien a concept as that seems to be). And in the work itself, he does not give in. It was pretty clear that throughout the final temptation that he was troubled and deep in thought about it--this even though Scorsese did not appear in the corner of the screen and explain it. Matter of "fact", I didn't get the impression that he thought all that "fondly" of it--there was a distinct distance in him the entire time.


>There's a core of discussion in the above--why the
>theological interpretation of anguish-without-temptation
>is more valid than the interpretation of anguish-with, or
>vice versa.

I'm not sure I understand this question yet. Help me out.

See, now, I think this might be part of the problem here. That wasn't a question--note the lack of hunchbacks. It was a statement of opinion--that the theological disconnect you mentioned contains the possibility of an interesting discussion. From a cursory lookthrough at some key passages in the gospels--Gethsemane, Satan up on the mountain offering up what wasn't his to give--it's an understandable argument that they don't necessarily show temptation per se, even though they do show anguish--let this cup pass from me, if it's possible...if it be your will, mine doesn't matter.

It's an understandable argument, but not airtight. For instance, why make a caveat about his own will not being considered against the Big Guy, if that will wasn't in conflict? If Jesus' will was in perfect consonance with God's, the statement "not by my will but yours" is irrelevant.

Furthermore, it is a human trait, and a very understandable one, that when one faces anguish and suffering because of something you need to do because it's the right thing--that there is also an undercurrent, and sometimes strong one, of wishing that you could avoid it. It's problematic to assert that in addition to being wholly divine that Jesus was also wholly human--but not human in this instance.


The vast majority of Christians ARE in favor of this kind of discussion. What very few of us are terribly enthusiastic about is being told by Willem Defoe and Roger Ebert how we ought to go about engaging in it. But even at that, the protestors only represented a very small minority of the Church.

Where did Ebert and Defoe make commandments about how discussion should proceed? Was it the same place that Scorsese said his only goal was the Almighty Dollar? My impression is that that place is inside the narratives inside peoples' skulls--and not out in the real world. Am I wrong in this?

To be honest, because a lot of the folks who were NOT out protesting didn't really get the impression that anybody wanted to know what they thought about it. I will confess that that was my assumption about your attitude, coming into this discussion. I'll quit trying to speak for the outragers.

If that gets us onto a track that gives you more useful information, then I'm glad.

You seem oddly fixated on useful information, and making assumptions about intent. What I've always found to be more useful is simply responding to what's actually said rather than interior hobgoblins, answering questions with as much honest clarity as can be mustered, and asking for clarity in return when needed or bits strike a curious chord.

[Mr. Billy]

This has gotten to be a little more than I can manage. I can't write a book about this stuff. Not this afternoon, at least.

Also, there's no need to get so frustrated about the relative thickness of my skull. I'm only trying to answer your questions, some of which we seem to have fundamentally differing attitudes about. For that, I would apologize if I could.

Your line of questioning about human nature, movies as theology and the accessability of authorial intent doesn't lead me to think you're especially inclined to drop those topics. It just makes me wish we could, because frankly, I'm bored with them and it's giving me a pain inside my thick skull. I was merely making a suggestion, for the sake of focusing on topics where we won't talk around and around in great, tiresome circles.

In spite of that, a few more tries...

Mass market movies seem to me an inappropriate tool for doing serious theology without raising great squeals of protest, because they cast too broad a net, as far as audience is concerned. Not everyone has the inclination or the candlepower to carry on discussions about the dual nature of Christ without getting all worked up into a lather, and I think you'll get more fire and less smoke if you do your deep thinking in an environment where you're more likely to find the kind of people who will be better prepared for it. There is also the matter of bare breasts and sexual fantasies (yes?) in a movie about the thought life of Jesus Christ that seems -- um -- indelicate.

This bit about authorial intent has begun to sound like an undergraduate seminar on critical theory. Formalist critics will read a text (or watch a movie) as you seem inclined to do, which is to say, as if it were a brute fact. That's fine, if you like that kind of thing, but I don't. Nor do most others. There simply cannot be a text (movie, etc.) without an author. As such, it is entirely legitimate to take authorial intent into account in determining how to respond. Further, you keep wanting to talk about the novel as divorced from Kazantzakis' introduction, or to discuss the movie, with the addition of some fictional statement about intent, but what you are ultimately suggesting in those instances is that we cease discussion of the works that actually exist. This would appear to violate your own text-and-text-alone view of reading. The novel does include an introduction that explicitly expresses authotrial intent. That introduction is a part of the work itself. Therefore, I have no choice but to take it into account as I form my assessment of the work, even if I propose to read as a formalist. For the movie -- of course -- there is no such statement of intent, but that doesn't mean that I can't try to determine what the intentions were. After all, the movie didn't happen by accident, so there must have been some reasons for its creation. Those reasons are at least partially accessible to me insofar as I am able to look at the facts about Scorsese himself, his career, his comments about the movie, its marketing and distribution and perhaps a hundred thousand other things. Of course, I can't crawl in his ear and talk to the little people inside his head about what -- precisely and irrefutably -- he's driving at, but I can draw some pretty reliable conclusions. That, too, is a fair move on my part.

At some point, we all have to begin connecting dots as best we can, or there's really very little point in even trying to communicate with one another. That's not to suggest that we just start twisting words into any old thing we want them to be whenever they're not accompanied by an explicit statement of intent. It's only to point out that at some point, we all have to stop waiting around for just a little more evidence and get on with our lives.

I think we've moved past the human nature thing and onto what you were asking about from the beginning, so I'm going to leave it alone this time.

On other matters...

What's interesting about LToC as a devotional tool is that it invites us to think about where the line between mere temptation and full-blown sin lies. What's troubling -- and especially so with the image-dependent movie -- is the way that it presents Christ's temptations. Merely wondering, "Would it have been fulfilling to live as nothing more than a man?" is not a sinful thing in and of itself. It is only kind of temptation. Spending an hour and a half speculating on the nuts and bolts of the proposition as Christ does in the movie is something much more like deciding to act on that temptation. (At least for a little while. In your mind. Where no one can see it.) Sin is like that. It takes you down by little steps and rationalizations and compromises. In many cases of temptation, a person might say no to the act itself, and yet still sin in their responses leading up to the denial. ("I tell you the truth, a man who looks at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.") Having spent a lot of time thinking about these things, most Christians are keenly aware of that dynamic, and to be honest about it, they do not believe that what Jesus does in LToC is necessarily so clean as the wind-driven snow. They know themselves to have sinned by exactly the same process. That's why some folks take the view that Kazantazakis (and Scorsese) are being irreverent at best with LtoC, if not outright blasphemous.

Newspapers are simplistic because they are not journals for the discussion of public policy. You will hate this, but the intent behind newspapers is only supposed to be that they get the facts out. Even serious and deep-thinking people read them. You should start.

DeFoe and Ebert were only rhetorical devices. Since one played Jesus in LToC and the other is a world famous movie reviewer, I figured you'd make the leap. I'll try to be clearer in the future.

Now, I suppose I have written a book.

[tracer]

Drastic wrote:


What's a hunchback?

The small symbol that ends your very own sentence. To wit, "?"--from the shape, you see. Its brother and constant adversary is the soldier, "!" from its ramrod spine.
Huh huh, you said "ramrod."

[Drastic]

This has gotten to be a little more than I can manage. I can't write a book about this stuff. Not this afternoon, at least.

Also, there's no need to get so frustrated about the relative thickness of my skull. I'm only trying to answer your questions, some of which we seem to have fundamentally differing attitudes about. For that, I would apologize if I could.

Why in the world would you apologize for holding fundamentally different attitudes? As far as answering questions go, thank you for finally making a direct go at one of the first ones I ever asked, about the whys of the film medium being inappropriate. I don't quite understand why that couldn't be done originally--I've always found that when trying to answer a question, answering them always works best.


Your line of questioning about human nature, movies as theology and the accessability of authorial intent doesn't lead me to think you're especially inclined to drop those topics. It just makes me wish we could, because frankly, I'm bored with them and it's giving me a pain inside my thick skull. I was merely making a suggestion, for the sake of focusing on topics where we won't talk around and around in great, tiresome circles.

I'm mildly sorry you're bored and in pain, but mostly I'm sorry about the gun to your head. People should never be forced to freely engage in debates, coercion of that nature is a terrible thing. I hope you get away from the gunman safely.


Mass market movies seem to me an inappropriate tool for doing serious theology without raising great squeals of protest, because they cast too broad a net, as far as audience is concerned. Not everyone has the inclination or the candlepower to carry on discussions about the dual nature of Christ without getting all worked up into a lather, and I think you'll get more fire and less smoke if you do your deep thinking in an environment where you're more likely to find the kind of people who will be better prepared for it.

Movies are inappropriate because (crikey, I asked the why of that awhile ago) the net is too broad. Anyone could end up seeing it. Material with any sort of depth is best suited to mediums that can focus more specifically on those prepared for it. Is that an accurate restating of your explanation?

My problems with that position occur in a couple of different ways. I'm remembering a certain parable involving the sowing of seed, and also mention of the casting of a net; I read them somewhere that seems somewhat germane, you see.

The other manner in which I'm having problems with that position is when I consider the nature of bookselling. A book is in a bookstore--anyone can come along and pick it up. A fellow might pick it up, read the dust jacket, and think, "hmm. A fictional musing on the nature of the Christ's duality. I'll pick this up." Right after him might come someone else who skims the dust jacket, giggles like a schoolchild who thinks he's getting away with something, and think "huh huh, I hear Jesus porks Mary Magdalene, that's HOT, I'm gonna get this!" The nature of the medium itself carries the danger of that with it--the net cast by a bookstore is pretty broad.

Is a book therefore also an inappropriate medium? I'm thinking--guessing, really--that the likely answer is "no" for that one, but I don't see how it's no for a book but yes for a movie. If literacy rates were vastly different than they are today, perhaps.


There is also the matter of bare breasts and sexual fantasies (yes?) in a movie about the thought life of Jesus Christ that seems -- um -- indelicate.

There's a few bare breasts shown in the film, yes. Magdalene's briefly at one or two points, I think, and a few others in the background of the John the Baptist scene. Would the movie have been less inappropriate if all nipples were covered? Bizarre, simply bizarre.

The central fantasy did involve sexual relations--hard to have a family without them. It's not quite anything I'd classify as a sexual fantasy. Jesus did admit to Judas early on in the film about looking at women and feeling lust, though that was never detailed. However, that's a minor side issue (I think that the presence of breasts isn't the major factor in your position, correct me if that thought's wrong)--I personally don't think of sexuality as something either shocking or something to gasp in horror about, but am aware that many other people, both Christians and not, don't share that view.


This bit about authorial intent has begun to sound like an undergraduate seminar on critical theory.

I paid very little attention in my one Lit Crit class, coasting through it with (in retrospect) disturbing ease. For the take-home final exam essay paper, I wrote a short story that involved a stadium of famous critics throughout history fighting to the death with axes and swords and such, in between spouting chunks of famous essays at one another. The professor gave it high marks, but mentioned that she was vaguely frightened by it.


Formalist critics will read a text (or watch a movie) as you seem inclined to do, which is to say, as if it were a brute fact. That's fine, if you like that kind of thing, but I don't. Nor do most others. There simply cannot be a text (movie, etc.) without an author. As such, it is entirely legitimate to take authorial intent into account in determining how to respond.

A "brute" fact? As opposed to a gentle fact?

In any case, authorial intent is indeed legitimate. But when there is no explicit statement of intent provided, the work itself does not become illegitimate. The words continue to mean what they mean; the image of a nail being driven through flesh and the agony resulting are there even if the author's not explicitly going on about how the physical anguish is only one level of the anguish Christ is suffering.


Further, you keep wanting to talk about the novel as divorced from Kazantzakis' introduction, or to discuss the movie, with the addition of some fictional statement about intent, but what you are ultimately suggesting in those instances is that we cease discussion of the works that actually exist. This would appear to violate your own text-and-text-alone view of reading.

They were questions (not statements, questions end in a different kind of punctuation for a reason) to try to ferry out some views on the works as they do exist--the whys of views being my whole overal thrust here, if you'll recall. You got to them much faster than the repeated questions about the inappropriateness of film as medium, for which I'm grateful.

I take it then, that your answer to: "If all extant copies of the novel were rounded up (a miracle was performed, either divine or diabolical, to accomplish this), and then replaced with copies exactly the same, with the omission of the explicit statement of intent...the nature of the novel would then change?" is "yes".

Taking that yes, in what manner would the meaning of it be changed? This is, sure enough, a hypothetical: it's a human thing to take the world as it is, consider how it might be if things were different, and think about that--I'm interested in how your assessment of the work would change if the work existed in that differing manner. It should be a very easy hypothetical to consider--the same text, with the exception of the words comprising the introduction not being there.


. For the movie -- of course -- there is no such statement of intent, but that doesn't mean that I can't try to determine what the intentions were. After all, the movie didn't happen by accident, so there must have been some reasons for its creation. Those reasons are at least partially accessible to me insofar as I am able to look at the facts about Scorsese himself, his career, his comments about the movie, its marketing and distribution and perhaps a hundred thousand other things. Of course, I can't crawl in his ear and talk to the little people inside his head about what -- precisely and irrefutably -- he's driving at, but I can draw some pretty reliable conclusions. That, too, is a fair move on my part.

At what point have you been accused of being unfair?

What facts about Scorsese affected the work's evaluation? What facts about his career did so? Which comments about the film? What noteworthy facts about those "hundred thousand other things"?


At some point, we all have to begin connecting dots as best we can, or there's really very little point in even trying to communicate with one another. That's not to suggest that we just start twisting words into any old thing we want them to be whenever they're not accompanied by an explicit statement of intent. It's only to point out that at some point, we all have to stop waiting around for just a little more evidence and get on with our lives.

Well, it seems to me that if you took over a hundred thousand pieces of evidence into consideration to form conclusions about a work, the physician might want to look inward. I must confess that I have doubts that that many pieces of evidence were, though.

An explicit statement of intent was lacking. I take it that in your view, the dots composing the work itself, in its absence, are not sufficient for connecting. In the absence of that explicit statement, what further is necessary?


I think we've moved past the human nature thing and onto what you were asking about from the beginning, so I'm going to leave it alone this time.

I think the human nature thing is being explored pretty well here--simply not as explicitly as I intended.


What's interesting about LToC as a devotional tool is that it invites us to think about where the line between mere temptation and full-blown sin lies. What's troubling -- and especially so with the image-dependent movie -- is the way that it presents Christ's temptations. Merely wondering, "Would it have been fulfilling to live as nothing more than a man?" is not a sinful thing in and of itself. It is only kind of temptation. Spending an hour and a half speculating on the nuts and bolts of the proposition as Christ does in the movie is something much more like deciding to act on that temptation. (At least for a little while. In your mind. Where no one can see it.) Sin is like that. It takes you down by little steps and rationalizations and compromises. In many cases of temptation, a person might say no to the act itself, and yet still sin in their responses leading up to the denial. ("I tell you the truth, a man who looks at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.") Having spent a lot of time thinking about these things, most Christians are keenly aware of that dynamic, and to be honest about it, they do not believe that what Jesus does in LToC is necessarily so clean as the wind-driven snow. They know themselves to have sinned by exactly the same process. That's why some folks take the view that Kazantazakis (and Scorsese) are being irreverent at best with LtoC, if not outright blasphemous.

Now, I look at that paragraph, and again I wonder why it couldn't have been present much earlier in all this.

Is it the general theological conclusion among Christianity today (inasmuch as anything like that can be generalized) that Christ was--despite the human side of his nature--without sin--clean as that snow? What's the support for that position?

The problem with that for me comes right back to Christ praying at Gethsemane. "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will." That pesky qualifer about differing wills again. It was my understanding that the root of sin lies, in essence, in man's will being divergent from God's, which leads to disobedience to God's will, which is why Christ was necessary in the first place. Is my understanding flawed there?


Newspapers are simplistic because they are not journals for the discussion of public policy. You will hate this, but the intent behind newspapers is only supposed to be that they get the facts out. Even serious and deep-thinking people read them. You should start.

Originally you assumed I wouldn't buy a newspaper if they were different from what they were. Now I'm going to hate them for being what they are? I hope you don't hope to make a living as a mindreader.

In any case, I do read the news--online. I'm not going to buy them offline is all.

This portion (and others) of the adventure may be looked back at later as an exercise of determining when tongue is in cheek, in the absence of clear statements of authorial intent (the absence being expressed in such things as overly-enthusiastic smiley-conservation).

DeFoe and Ebert were only rhetorical devices. Since one played Jesus in LToC and the other is a world famous movie reviewer, I figured you'd make the leap. I'll try to be clearer in the future.
Rhetorical devices can be marvelous things. They work best when they're expressing a cogent point, in my opinion. It's also my opinion that thinking a movie, or those involved or tangentially related to it, dictates or forces the course or form of a discussion on the same themes is a poor and addled thought, likely lonely for other ones to jostle with.

And clarity is more than a marvelous things; the beauty of clarity is that which makes stories of scales falling away from eyes and so forth so appealing. I think that the time to improve it isn't in the future, though, but in the now.

Now, I suppose I have written a book.
Again, my deepest sympathies about the gun at your head.

On the bright side, there's this:

Huh huh, you said "ramrod."

So you can see the audience is excited by things. Debateably too excited; probably something about those bare breasts.

[astorian]

Okay, let's try a better example than the Martin Luthr King one. I'll use a REAL example from recent headlines.

Gay activist groups condemned Kevin Smith's "Jay & Silent Bob Go to Hollywood," without ever seeing it, called it a homophobic film, and pressured Kevin SMith to make a public apology, as well as to donate money to some of their pet causes.

Interestingly, Smith pretty much knuckled under! He never gave an inch when Catholics complained about "Dogma," but he felt compelled to reassure gays that he didn't mean any real offense! (Guess that shows who REALLY has more clout in the world of show biz.)

But back to the main point- why did gays protest against a comedy they'd never seen? A comedy that actualy, like most Kevin Smith films, is completely gay-FRIENDLY*?

My guess is, when a group- ANY group- feels it has been mocked and insulted by popular culture on a regular basis, it's inclined to get angry and to take action. If they hear even a rumor that a new book/record/movie is going to insult them, they're likely to protest first and ask questions later.

Is it hard to understand why many gays are sensitive about the way they're portrayed on film? Not at all! They have good reason to worry about being portrayed as prancing, limp-wristed fairies, or as psycho killers ("Basic Instinct," for one), or as ___ (fill in your favorite stereotype). Hollywood has often made them look bad in the past, and they're quick to protest any perceived insult. SOMETIMES, however, their justified wariness leads them to see homophobia where it doesn't exist.

Well, based on recent history, it's not hard to understand why Christians expect the worst from Hollywood. Hollywood DOES mock Christianity on a regular basis. So, it's not surprising that Christians were outraged by the rumors they'd heard about LTOC. But like the gays protesting "Jay and SIlent Bob," I think that, in this case, many CHristians were up in arms about a film they SHOULDN'T have had a moral problem with.


* I say "gay-friendly" because

1) The guy making most of the fag-bashing jokes (Jay) is such an obvious idiot and loser, no one could possibly take him for a hero or role model, and...

2) In the aforementioned film "Dogma," Kevin Smith already established that Jay is himself a closet homosexual. (Chris Rock, an omniscient angel, revealed that.)

[China Guy]

Originally posted by gobear
As for Buddhism, well, the Red Hat Lamaist order in Tibet have a standing death threat against the Dalai Lama, [/B]
Gobear, do you have a credible cite for this particular statement? It does match what I know.

[Drastic]

Well, based on recent history, it's not hard to understand why Christians expect the worst from Hollywood. Hollywood DOES mock Christianity on a regular basis. So, it's not surprising that Christians were outraged by the rumors they'd heard about LTOC. But like the gays protesting "Jay and SIlent Bob," I think that, in this case, many CHristians were up in arms about a film they SHOULDN'T have had a moral problem with.

That's an analogy I agree with. What I was thinking originally was that just maybe there were reasons that ran deeper than sensitivity due to past and unrelated mockery. I'm pretty sure now that there weren't (but am leaving the door open to the possibility).

The directions things have taken since that original point have been pretty thought-provoking and rewarding, though.

Tangentially, there's at least one bit in "Clerks" where it's pretty clear Jay is more than likely closeted--Rufus the 13th apostle confirmed things, of course. And he's not alone--Smith has a thing about likely-closeted buddies, Randal and Banky off the top of my head, the latter being pointed out to the audience more overtly.

[Mr. Billy]

You asked:

>Is it the general theological conclusion among >Christianity today (inasmuch as anything like that can be >generalized) that Christ was--despite the human side of >his nature--without sin--clean as that snow? What's the >support for that position?

Yes. What makes Christ unique in the course of human history, and what makes him the only acceptable sacrifice for sin, is his perfect sinlessness, in spite of the fact that he was 'tempted in all things even as we are'. Support for that position comes from testimony throughout the NT, such as "Behold, The Spotless Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world," and perhaps a hundred thousand others. (For the sake of clarity -- here, in the now -- this is not to suggest that there are actually a hundred thousand others. Only that there are many, many, many of them. I'm going to leave it to you to find them, if you're interested. The one I've pointed to gives you a general idea of the thing.) I think the line about The Spotless Lamb of God is from one of the synotics -- John the Baptist, baptizing -- but I could be wrong.

Off of the top of my head, a great place for you to gain a fuller understanding of historical Christian perspectives on this group of ideas -- the sinfulness of fallen human nature, the necessary sinlessness of Christ as propitiation for sin, and the application of His death and resurrection in eschatological and personal terms -- would be the book of Romans.

An outstanding grammatico-critical commentary that will be helpful in walking you through both the Biblical Theology of Romans and the phrase-by-phrase dynamics of Paul's arguments themselves, is by C.E.B. Cranfield: 2 volumes, published as part of the International Critial Commentary series. You're going to need a working knowledge of koine Greek to get everything out of Cranfield, but even if you don't happen to have that sort of background, the english speaking exegesis is outstanding. And the appendices are dynamite.

That's not much of an answer for you to pick apart I suppose, but at least it's a pointer in the right direction. Sometimes, we have more success fighting ignorance on our own time, in less public fora.

Since there's no gun at my head -- and many thanks for relieving me of that deep, but unfounded concern (Whew!) -- I'm going to find something else to do now. I'll check back later, for more lessons on how to express myself clearly. Cheers for now.

--B

[Mr. Billy]

Thinking further on a slow day, to crystallize:

A major factor in the furor over LToC is the natural defensiveness that any group of people is bound to express, when they perceive that their most deeply-held beliefs have been treated disrespectfully. We are all deeply saddened by this sort of human fallibility.

Going deeper, the element of LToC that some Christians perceived as disrespectful was the film's strong tendency to imply that Jesus confronted temptation on the cross in a manner that was itself sinful. For those who are not familiar with Christian theology, this notion may require further explanation.

To wit:

Jesus himself, in the sermon on the mount (Matthew 5?), taught that it is possible to sin internally, even when a person refuses to sin outwardly. It is in this sense that Jesus appears (to some Christians) to sin in LToC.

The suggestion that Jesus committed sins would be offensive to Christians because the clear teaching of the NT is that he was -- and in fact had to be -- sinless, in spite of his fully-human vulnerability to temptation.

A good place to go for a fuller exploration of these ideas (if you don't have the time or desire to read the whole Bible) would be the book of Romans. In order to get a useful degree of insight into what Paul is getting at in Romans, I would recommend C.E.B. Cranfield's very excellent commentary.

I am of the opinion that Nikos Kazantzakis had no intention of suggesting that Jesus committed any sin, based upon his explicit expression of intent, included in LToC the novel. I am further of the opinion that Martin Scorsese was not aware of the thin ice he was skating on, theologically speaking. Or if he was, that he considered it his right to do so as an artist, and his duty to do so as a dollar-earning employee of the studio for which he was working. Therefore, it's my conclusion that there is a legitimate distinction to be drawn between LToc the novel and LToC the movie, and that LToC the movie suffers by comparison, as a work of serious theological inquiry.

For these reasons, it seems to me that the outrage expressed by those Christians whose sensibilities were offended by LToc the film was entirely understandable, even if it may also have been a short-sighted and poorly-conceived public relations tactic.

And I appreciate very much everyone's apparent willingness to curtail use of the word "fundamentalist" as a tool for shaming others' opinions out of existence.

--B

[Drastic]

The "hubbub that was, bub" (it's nonsensical, but I like the sound of it still) came about for several reasons:

1: a kind of kneejerk sensitivity. Beliefs seem to enhance combativeness in people (why that is should be treated as an ineffable reality that shouldn't be questioned); there's plenty of Hollywood output that makes light of Christianity and Christian themes, so when rumors that a big movie specifically devoted to blasphemy (rumors need to be colorful to spread best) occur, it led to a reaction of outrage first, examination later. On examination, this kind of reason is usually admitted to be rather small and misguided as reasons go.

2: Movies, and movie people in general (specifics are avoided), are an inappropriate medium to contain any deep themes, and this includes (or may be limited to, a question that seems unlikely to be addressed) even those themes that act as a door to lines of thought and questioning that more Christians should engage in.

The reason for that inappropriateness is at least threefold: first, the people involved tend not to make sufficiently (or sometimes any) explicit statements of their intent. In the absence of such statements, a work cannot be evaluated well even when it is woodenly faithful to source material where authorial intent was very clearly stated. The absence leads to filling in the blanks by taking into account a passel of non-specific data that sums up to a crass pursuit of the Almighty Dollar.

Secondly, the medium itself is inappropriate because it casts too broad a net. Deep issues, even (especially?) ones that more Christians should think about, should not be presented in a form that goes before a general audience, because of what might be a pearls-before-swine kind of theory. The jury is out on whether or not that inappropriateness would be eased if such a film wasn't put into general release, but was targetted more specifically.

Thirdly, despite that the themes are a door to questions more Christians should think about, movies are inappropriate to express them because their nature is tantamount to dictating how discussion should proceed. Details as to the reasoning and validity of this point are very sketchy at this time.

3: Although Jesus was tempted in all things as people were, that being tempted didn't include actually being tempted in any fashion beyond one or two seconds at the utmost. His response to it was always swift and sure, temptation had no power over him even though he was fully human in order to make his sacrifice worthwhile. The sorrow and anguish in his heart stemmed from entirely different things, of which temptation to diverge from his Father's will had negligible impact, despite that he prayed to be relieved from the duty if possible--the temptation to do so was either not present, or extremely fleeting.

The reason why temptation never tempted him (even though he was as the rest of us) is that he was perfectly sinless. He had no sinful nature, no sinful mind, committed no actions in deed or in thought that ever went against God-as-Father's will. This makes his prayers asking for mercy not by his will but God's somewhat inexplicable, but the resolution to that question is so complex that it takes at minimum two books to address it. The temptations as depicted in the film are uncomfortably close (or the same as) showing that there was sin in mind; thoughts dwelled on acting contrary to God's will, and that's either sin in the heart or close enough to it to make no difference. That there were bare breasts thought about makes it all the worse; even though Jesus was fully human, sexuality had no temptation that he couldn't dismiss in the time of an eyeblink.

All these reasons are self-evident (perhaps in a Biercean fashion), and questions are to be discouraged (questions are affronting because they only pick things apart; you sure as heck don't bundle up tares by picking at them), and disagreement and debate are painful and boring, and painful things should be avoided. Part of the problem is likely that, as in #2, the medium's audience is too general. In distinction, while it is true that no Almighty Dollar gain is possible, but that is likely balanced by the third fold of point 2; the idea that disagreements may be discussed without apologizing for holding different views, and that discussion should involve questions being answered, is telling how discussion ought to be engaged in.

Tos um up my personal views as to the reasons for the film's controversy:

Number one is unfortunate; people should strive not to have outrage-kneejerks even when sensitive.

Number two has a large number of serious flaws within it, or appears to; their presence is difficult to fully gauge without questioning.

Reason the third is quite interesting, and it's unfortunate that apparently the medium is inappropriate to its explication. The Bible's a fascinating read, I intend to put more time into it again (after finishing an initial pass through "the Gateless Barrier", a medieval Zen text fascinating in unrelated ways).

I would make the suggestion that the common reluctance, and often downright testy refusal and dismissal, of Christians to actually discuss the more difficult themes within it in open fora often does their cause more harm than good. In a similar way, I'm pretty sure that the current testiness and overly cautious approach to ever question has rather more to do with past dealings with non-Christians hefting around large shoulder-chips than it does with me--ref. the concern of opinions being shamed out of existence, which is a concern that appears to be about some other thread entirely and not this one. That, incidentally, is one of my major problems with too much concern for author intent--it's a fine thing, but people tend to drag in unrelated baggage when it's not explicit, and unrelated baggage and clarity are old enemies.

I'm not surprised by the reluctance, but I continue to be befuddled by it.

[Mr. Billy]

1. I agree with you that number one is a terrible shame. But the only people I know who have really been able to overcome this tendency are Vulcans and lobotomy patients.

2. Number two is a complex of questions about readership, textuality and the dissemination of ideas that would give a third year grad student in English Literature a headache. If serious people did not disagree about all kinds of things on these matters, the Stanley Fishes and Jacques Derridas of the world would have nothing left to do but to take a course in small engine repair and set up shop down at the local service station.

You can ask all of the questions you care to about this stuff, but you're going to have to get someone else to play, because it has been my experience that the discussion only takes place in the form of constant haggling over smaller and smaller quiddities and rhetorical distinctions. I just don't happen to care for this particular wrangle anymore.

As far as your difficulties with intentionality are concerned, you will find welcome support for your position in an essay titled 'The Intentional Fallacy', by Wimsatt and Beardsley. It's something of a seminal formalist statement. T.S. Eliot also put a lot of thought into questions about authorial involvement and intentionality, in his poetry and his critical writing and you might enjoy working your way through some of that as well. If you want to see where lit crit went after the formalists had had their day (which was quite a while ago) a pretty complete textbook to use would be 'Modern Literary Criticism' (or some such generic-sounding thing) by Davis and Schleifer.

3. Number three is interesting indeed. Although, I think you would do yourself more good in getting to the bottom of this, if you could drop the sarcasm. Sarcasm detracts from clarity, since it makes it difficult to discern whether you are actually failing to grasp the concepts, or merely expressing contempt for ideas that seem silly to you. A little humility goes a long way.

Questioning about number three is not bad, in and of itself. Nor do I know of any Christians who would discourage it, per se. It's only when people want to do their questioning in a manner that is insulting or glib or belligerent that its desirability changes. Given the state of affairs in #1 above, some large portion of the responsibility for controlling this dynamic has to rest with the conscientious and sincere questioner.

What makes questioning about number three difficult in a forum like this is that the prolegomena for that enterprise can take several semesters to cover. Most people -- even some Christians -- are laboring under a shocking number of misapprehensions about the shape and direction of Christian theology, and I mean no offense, when I say that I would put you in this category as well. As such, the prolegomena and the answering of the questions may be better left to professionals, especially when it comes to the kinds of questions you're asking.

They're good and fair questions, and we have taken several stabs at a number of them, to one degree or another. But I can tell you now that some random guy who gets a great deal of satisfaction out of offering extemporaneous lectures on the internet (which is to say, I myself) might not be the right person for you to spend too much additional time on. That's why I commend the Apostle Paul and Dr. C.E.B. Cranfield to you, in the highest possible terms.

Also, if you happen to have any friends who are Christians seriously conversant with their own world view, I would recommend that you hold their feet to the fire until they give you some help with the things you want to know about. Like humility, the trust and mutual respect that goes between good friends can go a long way too.

Good luck, happy trails.

--B

[Drastic]

What makes questioning about number three difficult in a forum like this is that the prolegomena for that enterprise can take several semesters to cover. Most people -- even some Christians -- are laboring under a shocking number of misapprehensions about the shape and direction of Christian theology, and I mean no offense, when I say that I would put you in this category as well. As such, the prolegomena and the answering of the questions may be better left to professionals, especially when it comes to the kinds of questions you're asking.

It's long been my suspicion that the first sentence there contains the explanation to the subject of the complaint in the second--and thus points right to the heart of an admittedly subtle (but big) problem with the third.

Theology hardly has a stranglehold on that phenomenon either. Any subject above a certain level of complexity very often receives a similar, well it would take a full courseload to even begin to explain it properly. Very often in the same breath as sighing about how people have misapprehensions about that same subject matter that is backed away from.

I think reasonably intelligent people can discuss complex subjects amongst themselves, and do pretty well at it. It's well within their capacities. It's one thing when people are simply uninterested in a subject--that's fine, something that gets greater GD time like, say, just who and how stole the election, is about like watching paint dry for me, but others salivate at it--but it's downright odd when interested people do the same.

It's a much less major world problem than that number one, but still.


They're good and fair questions, and we have taken several stabs at a number of them, to one degree or another. But I can tell you now that some random guy who gets a great deal of satisfaction out of offering extemporaneous lectures on the internet (which is to say, I myself) might not be the right person for you to spend too much additional time on. That's why I commend the Apostle Paul and Dr. C.E.B. Cranfield to you, in the highest possible terms.

Ah, but I don't consider any seeds involved to have landed on barren ground--of any of the grounds involved.


Good luck, happy trails.

Godspeed.